Valle Nevado and Friday night fun.

Valle Nevado was torture to begin with. I woke up at 630 AM, with only 3 hours of sleep or so, still drunk from the night before. I wasnt even the worst though, Danny came with us on the subway only to turn around when we got off, he felt too sick. Pancho, the professor´s son, was in the same boat as me, as waiting in line was agony. I blissfully drifted off to sleep, only to be awoken by one of the group members vomiting next to me, a couple too many windy curves up the mountain. We gained an extraordinary amount of elevation, I believe the peak was at either 9,000 or 11,000 feet. The views were absolutely stunning, unreal vistas of untamed, wild snow and no trees whatsoever interrupting the snow due to the altitude. It was a surreal, unimaginable view, unlike anything I have ever seen before.

The price was expensive, with gear totalling 50 dollars for rental, and another 20 odd dollars for the shuttle, before even getting a lift ticket. Luckily, there was a special promotion for Entel phone users, of which Pancho had one, so we got half price lift tickets, for 32 bucks a piece instead of 64. A couple of the girls in the group managed to make friends with some Chileans in line, but I felt bad, a couple people had to just pay the full price, making the cost well over 130 dollars US total. Anyways, we all got our tickets and headed for the mountain.

I stayed on a beginner´s slope, green to be exact, for the entire day, which was very rewarding to me. I have been snowboarding at least half a dozen times, but I am consistently afraid to gain speed, and controlling my stops is a difficult thing as well. However, with persistence and caution, I slowly gained a better sense of control, focusing on areas that I felt needed improvement, such as my toe edge, and stopping better. I ended up taking 6 or 7 runs total down the mountain, which for me was a very satisfying, accomplished feeling. Lunch was expensive at the resort, but had a couple empenadas and a five dollar Red Bull to keep me going.
Swine reared its ugly head again, as a girl that I had been sitting 4 feet away from at lunch came down with symptoms as we were eating. Poor girl had paid the full amount to come, and only ended up skiing for less then a couple hours.

At the end of the day, we were treated to another magnificent, stunning view of the mountains as we wound down the hairpin turns, exhausted yet completely exhuberant. I was a little sore, in both legs and arms from falling on them, but surprisingly not as much as I had expected. Still though, sleep was nearly instant upon returning to the apartment.

Friday I woke up feeling sick and congested, to the point where I didn´t make it to class. I was too sore and had caught at least a slight cold up in the mountains, or perhaps only altitude sickness. Regardless, I would not have been able to give the lecture my full attention, and extended sleep was in order. In the afternoon, after sleeping and medicine, I felt a little better and decided to follow through with my plans for the day, being a jam session and fire spinning.

Gonzalo, my neighbor in Boston who is from Santiago, gave me directions to his house that afternoon. I took a cab over for just over 10 bucks, not bad considering I would have had to take 3 buses, and was cheap compared to anywhere in the states (It was a fairly long distance ride.) I arrived at Gonzo's house at around 6 oclock, a VERY nice house in a suburban neighborhood outside of Santiago. His family was obviously a member of the upper class here, interesting to visit one of the homes after learning so much of the sociopolitical divides and class system present in Chile. We went downstairs, to the jam room, and jammed on bass vs. piano then guitar vs. bass until more of his friends showed up. If it wasn´t obvious, the kid is a VERY talented musician by the way, so it was an absolute joy to play with him. We went through a large variety of styles and genres ranging from blues to funk to jazz to rock, before a couple of his friends arrived an hour or two later. It was Martin, whose house I had already been to, and a friend of his, Justin, who spoke flawless English and studied at Wash. Univ. in Seattle.

From there the jam really picked up. We ended up trading instruments multiple times, since I could play all the ones present (guitar, bass, piano, drums). It was one of the best times I had in Santiago, just hanging out, drinking and smoking and playing music with talented musicians. My band in Boston cannot improvise in the same manner as these kids, particularly Gonzo, a jazz trained musician who has been playing since age 4. I ultimately had to run though, since I had plans to meet my two Mexican friends from La Serena at 10. But a solid 4 hours at least had been spent jamming, and I was even invited to come back, and have dinner with his family that Monday.

I met up with Selene and Sandra, who I had talked with on the bus to the stars in La Serena, and walked back to my apartment to grab fire toys. I had a drink, as we talked about plans for the night. They were keen to check out the jazz club I had been at, but we decided after fire spinning and taking a bus, we would get there quite late and would not be worth it. We walked down to a deserted park nearby, where I set up my equipment. Prior to spinning, the wierdest photo was taken, by Selene - it was of me and Sandra, but there is a white cloud shaped like a ghost next to us!! I dont believe in ghosts or anything, but this picture has to be seen to be believed, it was very surreal. In addition, the park was kind of sketchy and abandonded, which I only considered after looking at this photo. Anyways, after the fuego, we just went to Flannery´s, the pub around the corner from my apartment, had a beer and some food, and called it a night. I walked the girls to a bus, and went to sleep excited for horseback riding in the Aconcagua Valley the next day. No one could say I have not been maximizing my time here!